Author Description

At a time when media are being increasingly centralized and globally monopolized, it is important to examine the role that marginal and peripheral media play in shaping social, cultural and political interactions. The notion of marginality is defined broadly to include disenfranchised and disadvantaged places and people, as well as media technologies and institutions which fall outside of what is usually referred to as the "mainstream". Although there is already a sizable body of work available on the media in Asia and the Pacific in general, the editors take the view that it is time to examine the region in a more critical manner than hitherto. Within a broad and multi-disciplinary approach, featuring new and original research based on extensive field work carried out by the contributors on their area of expertise, this important volume looks at how issues of equality, equity and access manifest themselves in various locations in the region, and what kinds of initiatives and strategies can be identified (locally) as ways of combating globalization and deregulation. The editors valorize neither the nation-state nor the internationalizing technologies - both of which will be shown to have their own universalizing logics against which a highly diverse periphery struggles to maintain its necessarily contradictory multi-vocality. This book not only fills a gap in the study of the media in Asia, it also provides a very useful alternative way of looking at global media and is essential reading for all students and practitioners involved in Asia-Pacific studies.